Judy's Story

[jamdls]

I was 13 the first time I got drunk and by 17 (legal drinking age at the time was 18) I was drinking every day. I used to have a thermos of OJ and vodka every day before school in my senior year, and was doing occassional drugs. I was raised by an absent alcoholic father, he was career military so was often oversees and a non drinking cold and distant mother. My father retired when I was 14 and his drinking got worse and he became verebally and sexually abusive towards me. I got married at 19 to a non drinking very religous guy and I stopped drinking and found religion. We divorced 4 yrs later and I went right back to alcohol and drugs, as a result I don't remember much of my 20s. At 32 I married a pot smoking executive (he did have a successful professional career) and so I smoked and dranked with him; then a couple years into that I decided to quit it all and was sober for about 3 years. In 1994 mr pot smoking successful left me for another woman, I sunk deeper and deeper into depression and starting in 1995 I went on a 12 year drinking binge. I somehow managed to maintain employment and stay out of jail during this time (except for one PI). I remember very very little of my 40's and what I do remember is very shameful.
I sunk so deep into depression, and drank to medicate which of course just made everything worse. I have no memory of the night everything ended, I don't even remember taking the first drink-- but I found a receipt for the purchase of a bottle of wine and for the purchase of a glass of wine at a restaurant, and I know I had a bottle of wine in my house before that night (I generally did). Apparently after drinking about 2 bottles of wine I decided to take an Ambien then take the whole bottle then a bottle of vicodan and a bottle of darvocet (each had at least 12 in them). I don't remember any of it, I left a note for my daughter saying I just wanted to sleep forever. About 36 hours later God woke me up, there is no other explanation, I live alone and no one was looking for me. I ended up spending a week in the hospital because the drugs had ripped a hole in my liver and it was failing-it had been too late to pump my stomach. Thank God they were able to repair my liver as I was denied a transplant due to "evidence of alcoholism".
I kept blaming the overdose on the Ambien, "Ambien made me do it". I had all kinds of hallucinations that week in the hospital, I thought they were punishing me, I wouldn't take responsibility. It wasn't until my 6th day that I accepted that I was an alcoholic-within just a couple of hours of a physician telling me that I would live (I'd been told the day before my chances were very slim), I'll never forget his words "YOU DODGED A BULLET LADY", he was not very nice and I understand now. It hit me like a ton of bricks, but instead of that ton of bricks tearing me down it started me on a new path. It took me another week before I had the strenghth both physical and mental to attend an AA meeting but I did and it gave me the tools to put myself together. I lost decades of my life to alcohol but not 1 more minute will be lost for me. I am very very proud to be in recovery, I'd shout it from the rooftops. People are often surprised when I just come out and say I'm an alcoholic like it's something I should be ashamed of, I'm definetly not. I was ashamed of my drinking and proud of my sobriety.